Intimate Portraits (19 page)

“I don’t know, Fran,” Victoria
demurred. “I’m not much for hiking. My ankle tends to swell if I walk far.”

He bent over her, stretching both
hands out to the back of her chair as if to trap her between his arms, and gazed
into her eyes. “Vicky, even a couch potato like you can do this walk. Come on,
sweet thing. I’ll carry you if you can’t make it. I promise.”

“I don’t know.” She threw a flirtatious
glance toward Rennie. “Are you going, Rennie?”

“Sure,” he said in his easy
manner. “I’m game.”

Autumn was the lone holdout.

“Come on, Autumn, it’ll be fun.”
Fran left Rennie to keep Victoria from backing out while he came over and
tugged at Autumn’s hand. He entwined his fingers in hers, flashing the intimate
smile that seldom failed to bring the feminine object of his attentions to her
knees.

Autumn, immune to Fran’s charms,
unwound her hand. “I think I’ll laze around here.” Her shoulder still hurt from
the fiasco on the bridge.

Besides, Victoria had resumed her
proprietary air toward Rennie this morning. There was no reason to tag along while
the chic newscaster hung onto his every word.

And Autumn didn’t want to chance
ending up alone with Rennie until she could be sure they would have time to
finish what she intended to start.

Sooner or later he would offer considerate
apologies and reasoned arguments for not making love to her. Unless she had
time to break down his resistance, his apologies would be one more block in the
barrier between them.

When she thought about throwing
herself at him, she got sick to her stomach.

But what else can I do?

How often had she tried to become
a part of her uncle and aunt’s closeness, and how often had she been
disappointed? How often had she joined in the Degardoveras’ adventures only to
find herself eventually sent back to her aunt and uncle?

All her life, she’d been left on
the outside, looking in at happiness.

If she lost her chance to be a
part of Rennie’s future because she was afraid of rejection…

Well, she wouldn’t. That’s all
there was to it.

In the end, everyone except
Autumn went down to the trail.

Chapter 12

As his beige van crawled down the
deserted street, Sam Bogatti checked out the positions of the isolated cabins.

Cars took up most of the parking
spaces in front of the lower cottage where the couple from the hotel had
disappeared, but that didn’t matter. He wasn’t about to park there.

Smoke rose from the chimney pipe.
The photographer would be inside with her friends, curled up beside a warm
fire. Laughing and enjoying herself. Unsuspecting. Must not have heard about
the fire or she’d have rushed home. Maybe his luck would hold and he could take
her before she got word.

As Sam chewed his gum, he brooded.

Seemed a shame, wasting a pretty
woman like that when she had a good-looking boyfriend and no small talent for
taking sexy pictures.

Everything to look forward to,
future looking all rosy.

Except it wasn’t.

Life was a bitch.

“The wife’s right. I'm too
soft-hearted. I've got to toughen up. Can’t worry about everybody.”

Parking down the street across
from another set of cabins, he lay back against the headrest. In his rearview
mirror he could see the front of the cabin hiding his mark.

From the number of cars, several
people were inside. He didn’t want to take her out in front of witnesses, but
he couldn’t stay here either. Not for long. Park officials were the worst of
bureaucrats, the kind who routed out unauthorized vehicles and ticketed them. He
for frigging sure couldn’t afford to be questioned or recalled after what was
going down today.

Ten fifteen. They’d check out and
leave for Atlanta soon. No way was he trailing them back down there. It’d take
him another half day to get started home.

Either he could knock on the door
and risk being seen, or stay here and wait, hoping she would come outside where
he could get to her. And he didn’t have long to decide.

Below him, on a path circling the
lake behind the cabins, a group of exuberant hikers swarmed into sight. Despite
the distance, he recognized the couple from the hotel. With them were the two
brothers and the perky TV broad from last night.

Nobody else. He sat up for a
closer look. Yep, no blonde photographer among them.

The group disappeared behind
trees.

Leaning back, he considered. Autumn
Merriwell might not be inside the cottage.

No, odds were good that she was. The
rest of the walkers had been with her last night in the pizza place, along with
that older couple and the other sister and her admirer. The older couple had
left early—he’d heard them say they had a long drive back to Atlanta—but the second
brunette and her stocky man had been with the group milling around afterward.

They weren’t with the walkers. That
meant maybe three people in the cabin. He could cope with three.

Okay, he’d wait here and watch
the entrance a little longer. If everything seemed okay, he’d try the door.
Wouldn’t take two minutes to get in, do her and whoever was with her, then get
out.

He stroked the Ruger. Its cold
smoothness cleared his mind.

Yeah, he was right to use it. No
time for niceties out here in the boonies. He’d played around long enough, been
frustrated once too often. Give her five minutes and if she didn’t come out, he’d
go to the door and finish it.

As he put the silenced Ruger in
his lap and took a ski mask from the console compartment, his rearview mirror
showed a Ferrari pull up and park in front of the cabins. He stiffened at a
splash of blue emerging.

The blue-coated driver leaned back
in before straightening with some plastic grocery sacks. Her jacket hem flared
like a cape while the morning sun reflected blonde highlights.

Bingo. Patience was rewarded.
Thank
you, lady luck.

Cranking the van, he swung it
around. Behind the parked cars, he rolled down the window just as she reached
the steps leading down to the two cabins and stopped.

With her back toward him, not six
feet away, she dug into her purse like she was looking for a door key. The blue
jacket stretched out nice and inviting across her shoulders.

An easy mark.

One smooth movement and the Ruger
lay steady on the window frame.

He popped her three times. Once through
the head and twice in the back.

She crumpled to her knees.

Plastic sacks hit the ground. A
roll of paper towels and a six-pack spilled out into the dirt alongside a
carton of light bulbs.

She fell on her face beside them,
bright blood spreading over the blue coat.

Nausea struck.

Jeez, his stomach. This part
always got him.

Think about something else
.

Stash the gun. He inhaled and
exhaled as he stuck the Ruger under the seat. The queasiness subsided. He drove
off.

If she wasn’t dead when she hit
the ground, she would be in minutes, bleeding like water from a faucet.

No one had seen him. The few
people he’d spotted since entering the park were the hikers lost on the trail
below and the drivers of occasional cars on the main road.

His license plates were obscured
by mud. He was safe.

The weekend was shot to hell, but
for consolation, he’d be home in time for the kid’s hockey practice Tuesday
afternoon.

A weight lifted.

As he wheeled the van down the
hill toward the park exit, a man emerged from the woods and started down the
road toward the cabins.

Sam drove past him, putting his
hand up to his face. But the walker never looked his way.

Dark face, dark hair, athletic
build.

The photographer’s boyfriend. Too
bad he had to come back to that. And too bad a woman with Autumn Merriwell’s
talent for taking pictures had to die.

Sometimes his conscience bothered
him.

You’re getting soft, Sammy
.

Time to think of leaving this
business. He could look into buying that motel in Florida his brother-in-law
kept yammering about going halves on.

Nah, he was tired. The past few
days had been hell, what with Sarita—Sarita Sartowe!—turning out to be his
target, and then the screw-up with the photos and the trouble finding the
photographer.

All over now. He’d put in a few
more years, then retire like he planned.

He found a decent music station
on the radio, stuck a fresh piece of gum in his mouth, and kept driving.

Going home. Yeah, man.

****

Autumn jumped. Her eyes flew
open. Her heart raced.

What was that?

Dazzling white light highlighted
cedar paneling, black stovepipe, and brown carpet under dark high-beamed
ceilings.

Where was she?

The park cabin. Helen. Rennie.

The bright light came from sunshine
streaming through tall windows. The woodstove window glowed red in front of the
loveseat where she sat with feet up on an ottoman and head on a cushion.

She’d been thumbing through a
magazine while the others went for a walk.

Ah. Now she remembered.

Her heartbeat slowed to normal.

I must have dozed off.

She rubbed her eyes. Something
seemed wrong. Out of place. The cabin lay silent except for the crackle of
burning wood,

What had cut through her sleep so
abruptly?

And she
had
been asleep.
Fast asleep.

A strange turbulence charged the
air. Sitting up, she stretched, then mentally shook herself. She was being
foolish. Worrying about what she would say to Rennie and what he would say to
her had worn her down.

A noise—physical and not
supernatural—had awakened her.

Backfire. There hadn’t been much
traffic on the road by the cabin, but loud cars abounded wherever you went
nowadays.

Or firecrackers. It could have
been a firecracker. There’d been lots of them in Helen last night.

She yawned and listened, but
heard nothing more.

What time was it? Rennie had
agreed that checking out at eleven would give them plenty of time to eat lunch
and catch the live glockenspiel at two.

Ten thirty-five. He and the
others hadn’t been gone long enough to circle around the lake.

Restless, she picked up the
magazine dropped on the floor. It was the latest issue of a popular Atlanta
magazine, and the cover showed a smiling Danielle Huertole in businesslike navy
suit and white ruffled blouse. She stood with her arms crossed, posed so that
the High Museum of Arts loomed in the background to her side.

HIGH MUSEUM’s COUP
, read the headline.
ASSISTANT
DIRECTOR BRINGS PRICELESS TREASURES TO THE ATL
. Further down in smaller
captions, another article started:
Will Dani’s Gus Become Georgia’s Gus? Supporters
Say Si, Pollsters Say Probably.

Fran must have brought the
magazine up to show John so they could gloat over the free publicity for their
candidate.

A sudden thought made her frown.
Could Fran’s warmth toward Victoria have an ulterior motive? She hoped not. It
would be wonderful if Fran and Victoria hit it off.

Come on, be honest.
Fran’s happiness was the last
thing on her mind. She was thinking that with an attractive, sexy television
personality out of the way, she’d have no competition for Rennie.

For shame. Whatever character she
had was rapidly going down the tubes.

Discarding the magazine, she lay
back and stared into space.

She had to figure out what to say
to Rennie on the drive home. This morning he had ignored her like he was
embarrassed. After the way she’d thrown herself at him last night, conversation
was bound to be strained going home.

That could be why he was avoiding
her today. Because of her outright assault on his virtue.

Heat rose up her neck. Had she
been that aggressive? Had she really ground against him until he’d had enough?

One thing was clear. No matter
what happened, their old easy friendship was ended. Either she would make him
see her as an available sexual partner rather than a little sister, or else
they’d retreat to being mere acquaintances.

Far too late to go back to where
they’d been before.

Nor did she want to.

****